Retro fit (using Lox Air products) Vs installing in a new build (hard wired)

[Gast]

Hi

We stumbled across Loxone fairly late into our planning process for a Bungalow renovation. I really like the look of the Loxone system, however i'm rapidly running out of time and more importantly money. What are the major advantages to having a hardwired setup rather than just going the retrofit Loxone air route? I don't really see the point of having loxone unless you go for almost everything.... lighting, heating, audio, intercom, heat and motion sensors. However to have all that is adding about £20k to the cost of our build, money we could do without spending!

Does anyone have any advice for things we could do now to allow for a Loxone system to be added at a later stage?

Thanks.

[duncan]

hardwire is cheaper for loxone hardware, but more expensive for 1st fix wiring, and requires more advanced planning for your structure.

air is obviously easier, allows later expansion (although you can add air devices to your wired setup anyway) but costs more

some people (including me) dont trust wireless as a primary control system for heating and lighting - even for networking i only use wireless for mobile devices and use wired for fixed devices like computers, tvs, media players etc

if you hardwire in a structured way then you could replace loxone with another make of automation should that be necessary. obviously you could replace a wireless solution with another wireless solution as well though....

however, if you get the chance to hardwire everything, you can use loxone as the central control for 3rd party hardware and reduce costs dramatically - so if you use 3rd party dmx dimmers for lighting and dmx relays for heating control, 1-wire sensors (3rd party) for temperature then your prices will reduce dramatically. if you go down the electric blinds route then a hardwired motor is around £50 but the air motor is nearer £200.

if you need loads of inputs then integrating the elexol io72 will reduce your need for extensions to 1 or even 0

add a few knx fancy switches in your reception and kitchen areas and use click definity or schneider screwless plates elsewhere and you have a very slick install,

one of my clients just got a quote for a very large loxone only install using some air components, and the hardware costs ran the £30k. by using 3rd party dmx dimmers and relays and a few other tweaks i got that down to less than £10k but it requires some advance planning and work to integrate other components